Rest of the draft is too hard to tell. Need to wait a few more years. Same thing with 2010 and 2011 draft classes.

All in all, we've drafted pretty well since the lockout. Looking back, we've definitely passed on quite a few gritty players for skill players that never panned out though. But, you could just as easily look at it the other way for a lot of teams; they've passed on skilled players for gritty players that never make it to the show.

It's all a crapshoot. But, I like our stable with Nyquist, Tatar, Smith, Jarnkrok, Pulkkinen, etc.

Great list, but it really shows you more success than failure. Really O'Reilly, Lucic, and the Kindl for like five better choices is the only really bad bits. I mean Kindl for Letang would have been an epic improvement. Could you imagine if they traded down and got Neal and Letang with Abs?

You always have to remember any pick changes all the future picks though. Getting Letang might have caused us to pass on Smith. Who knows. I like our prospects, but there were some bad picks. Though show me the GM that gets them all right and I will show you a team that never loses.

"It is a lot easier to be an ******* to words than to people"-xkcd

Tootoo does NOT belong on this team. He is classless and I would rather see the Wings be bad than classless. I feel the same way about Bertuzzi as well, but he at least CAN make the team better. With Tootoo the team becomes worse and in danger of being classless. Would you have liked Claude on the team? Or Roy? No. So why would you be okay with that POS.

This thread has been closed due to emotions being higher than people's ability to read, interpret, and properly respond to simple posts.

And its not just us that passed on Lucic, its 30 other teams as well...

Anyway, Holland has always said they draft skill over size because players can always get bigger, and if they're standing out as an undersized 17 year old that it says something about their compete level.

"If I can be totally honest, it's not a lot of guys you get impressed by. Actually, it's no one else but him. From the bench, to see what move he makes -- you're like, 'I wish I could do that.' Sometimes you sit on the bench and just think, 'wow,' and you look over to the other bench and they sit there and shake their heads, too. He has great, great skills. I'm probably not going to play with another player who has the kind of skills he has." Mikael Samuelsson on Pavel Datsyuk

Anyway, Holland has always said they draft skill over size because players can always get bigger, and if they're standing out as an undersized 17 year old that it says something about their compete level.

Teams in the 1970's drafted size over skill when the NHL was like the UFC.

And its not just us that passed on Lucic, its 30 other teams as well...

Anyway, Holland has always said they draft skill over size because players can always get bigger, and if they're standing out as an undersized 17 year old that it says something about their compete level.

While it's true that other GM's passed on Lucic, and nobody back then knew what potential he had - however GM's look for a certain "quality" in young players...It's why Holland, and Nill tend to draft smaller/skilled guys like Hudler over brutes like Lucic.

That undersized 17 yr old may do just fine in the Canadian Junior/NCAA/Euro leagues, but the NHL is a different story.